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Ren茅e Baillargeon

Professor of Psychology, University of Illinois

鈥淢aking Sense of Others鈥� Actions:

Psychological Reasoning in Infancy鈥�

Stewart Building, Room S1/3

Friday, April 9, 2010, 3:30 PM

1205 Dr. Penfield Ave (at Stanley)

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Beginning early in the first year of life, infants attempt to make sense of听others鈥� intentional actions. Although the nature and development of infants鈥櫶齪sychological reasoning (or 鈥渢heory of mind鈥�, as it is sometimes called)听remain the subjects of intense controversy, the notion that infants already听possess some understanding of others鈥櫶齛ctions is becoming widely accepted. In much of the research on this topic,听infants watch simple scenes in which a person acts on objects (e.g., a听person reaches consistently for chocolates as opposed to carrots).

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Investigators examine what mental states infants attribute to the person,听and how they use these mental states to interpret and predict the person鈥檚听actions. Results indicate that infants in the first year of life are able to听attribute at least two kinds of mental states to a person: motivational听states (e.g., goals, dispositions), which specify the person鈥檚 motivation in听the scene, and reality-congruent informational states (e.g., the person's听knowledge or ignorance), which specify what accurate information the person听possesses or lacks about the scene.

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Over the past few years, experiments on听reality-incongruent informational states have focused on the question of听whether infants also realize that a person can hold false or pretend beliefs
about a scene. In my talk, I will review evidence that, when attempting to听make sense of a person鈥檚 actions in a simple scene, infants take into听account not only the motivational and reality-congruent informational but听also the reality-incongruent informational 听states of the person.